Richard Carrier - The Hero Savior Analogy

[Arkilogue]

None of which makes him "god."

The ability to lay down his life and take it back up is a good start. But he also is alleged to have said "Ye are gods."

[Minimalist]

Making more silly claims is simply piling on.  Why not try demonstrating the basic fact of existence first?

[Arkilogue]

Making more silly claims is simply piling on.  Why not try demonstrating the basic fact of existence first?

I no longer find it necessary.

[The Grand Nudger]

Well, you may not, but any pretense of consideration or support for the words you put in the demi-gods mouth goes right out the window at that point.  May as well be -you- saying "ye are gods".  In fact, I think it is.

[Arkilogue]

Well, you may not, but any pretense of consideration or support for the words you put in the demi-gods mouth goes right out the window at that point.  May as well be -you- saying "ye are gods".  In fact, I think it is.

Neither Jesus or I are the first to assert that all living individualities/souls are the progeny of the original Living One.

Life begets life, consciousness begets consciousness.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

None of which makes him "god."

The ability to lay down his life and take it back up is a good start. But he also is alleged to have said "Ye are gods."

And Valentine Michael Smith said, 'Thou art god.' Doesn't make it so.

Boru

[Mudhammam]

.....what sense does it make so say that it contains a historical jesus, particularly when you can't even tell me which caricature is more accurate than another?

That's the challenge that historians face when approaching more or less any ancient figure. Did Imhotep really design the first stepped pyramid? Was Socrates really ironic? Was Jesus really an apocalyptic preacher? Etc.

A book full of caricatures about me would be no more representative of "the historical rhythm". Regaradless of the fact that I exist in the here and now, that doesn't actually give anyone any good -reason- to think that I did..centuries (or even just decades) into the future. You'd ask for corroborating data, wouldn't you? You wouldn't be satisfied with a book of exaggerated descriptions of the archetypal redneck as "the historical rhythm", would you? When that corroborating data turns out to be simple misinterpretation all the way to fraud, and so does the book of caricatures...would you -still- feel confident that one of the caricatures is "the historical rhythm"?

If the volume of noise was the same and included a number of mundane and even embarrassing details, I'd feel confident that there are facts to be known about the historical rhythm even if buried underneath a heap of prejudice, exaggeration, and delusion.

Actually Carrier is talking about the quality of the evidence for the godboy.... which is virtually non-existent and would not be accepted as valid for any other character in any other novel.

If that's all he is arguing for here then I concur that it's not a bad analogy. I thought he was making the claim that Rhythm seems to be in his conflation of people as they were (or weren't) versus those "same" people as recorded by their initial devotees in history (the same mistake Christians make but in the opposite direction), i.e. no godboy = no historical man revered as a fictional deity.

[Angrboda]

 A book full of caricatures about me would be no more representative of "the historical rhythm".  Regaradless of the fact that I exist in the here and now, that doesn't actually give anyone any good -reason- to think that I did..centuries (or even just decades) into the future.  You'd ask for corroborating data, wouldn't you?  You wouldn't be satisfied with a book of exaggerated descriptions of the archetypal redneck as "the historical rhythm", would you?  When that corroborating data turns out to be simple misinterpretation all the way to fraud, and so does the book of caricatures...would you -still- feel confident that one of the caricatures is "the historical rhythm"?

If the volume of noise was the same and included a number of mundane and even embarrassing details, I'd feel confident that there are facts to be known about the historical rhythm even if buried underneath a heap of prejudice, exaggeration, and delusion.

The question is not simply whether or not there is a signal in the noise, but what exactly is signal and what is noise. "Hero Savior" implies things about the role of the man. Nobody cares much about a historical Yeshua without the miracles. The signal that people care about could just be noise. Thus it's important to sort out not only that 'some' of the narrative may be true, but what that 'some' of the narrative actually is. The evidence we have is poor witness to that question. We are interested in verifying the existence of miracle Yeshua, not that of Yeshua the man. Nobody cares a fig about the idea that there was an ordinary man named Yeshua in the first century.

[The Grand Nudger]

That's the challenge that historians face when approaching more or less any ancient figure. Did Imhotep really design the first stepped pyramid? Was Socrates really ironic? Was Jesus really an apocalyptic preacher? Etc.

Indeed it is, How about we start smaller, though?  Was imhotep, was socrates, was jesus?

If the volume of noise was the same and included a number of mundane and even embarrassing details, I'd feel confident that there are facts to be known about the historical rhythm even if buried underneath a heap of prejudice, exaggeration, and delusion.

Don't talk to me about noise or embarrassing details.  You don't know what would have embarrassed the author.  You're attempting to buttress fiction by way of fiction.

[Minimalist]

If that's all he is arguing for here then I concur that it's not a bad analogy.

Space limitations precluded putting the whole chapter up to that point in the post. 

He began by taking the claim "I have a car," and what evidence would be needed to substantiate that rather ordinary claim.

He then proceeded through various stages up to "I have an interstellar space ship" and contrasted what the evidence for that would be in comparison. 

The whole essay is here:

http://infidels.org/library/modern/richa...stian.html